The Ides of June Read online

  I could think of nothing sensible to say.

  ‘It could be an exaggerated grievance, anyway.’ Marcus took the writing-tablet back again, bound it together and put it carefully away. ‘But you can see why I am concerned about this threat – it could not have come at a worse time for me. Because the wretch is right, of course. I have been under imperial patronage for years and suddenly I am left without recourse. Well, it’s clear what I must do.’

  ‘Act as your family have done in Rome and move away to safety somewhere else?’ I asked. ‘Obviously this country house is no escape. Your townhouse in Corinium, possibly? It would not be safe to use the Glevum flat, I suppose.’

  He shook his head. ‘I’m not talking about me. I don’t propose to flee. That would be cowardly. And against my duty as a magistrate. The Empire has need of what legal officers it has, now more than ever. Justice must be done and law must be upheld as long as possible. I shall attend the court.’

  ‘Despite the threat of edicts from the Emperor?’

  ‘Because of them, perhaps. It’s harder to capture a lion than a mouse – I have support among the populace, and arresting me is likely to enrage the mob. Of course the curia would not be swayed by that alone, but they can’t be certain what the long-term future is. When Didius is overthrown – as I’m convinced he will be soon – his successor might punish them for laying hands on me. And they’re aware of that. So I shall stay and maintain my duties in court, though – given the letter from this maniac – I shan’t take the risk of constant travelling all the way out here. I’ll move into the town apartment.’

  I nodded. ‘Where you have your enormous doorkeeper as a bodyguard?’ I had met the man in question once or twice – a giant bear-like fellow, twice the size of any other gatekeeper I have ever seen and with appalling breath. The smell alone would fell a would-be assassin in his tracks. ‘That would be wise, I think. But he can’t be everywhere – come to court with you, and protect your flat as well.’

  ‘I am aware of that,’ Marcus said soberly. ‘I’ll keep armed slaves about me – as a magistrate I’m entitled to have lictors guarding me, though I have never used them up till now – and I’ll engage a food-taster, as well. I’ll make sure that no member of the public comes to me, without a search for hidden knives and daggers – in the court, or out. I shall have the best protection I can buy. But after that I’ll have to take my chance.’

  I shook my head. ‘Are you quite sure, Excellence? Would it not be wiser to move right away from Glevum as soon as possible? With this new Emperor in power, you will have public enemies as well as private ones.’

  He cut me off. ‘I am a Roman, a patrician, and my duty keeps me here. It is my wife and family that I worry for. And that’s where you come in. Your first duty as their legal guardian.’

  I was astounded. How could an aging Celtic pavement-maker be of help? ‘You wish me to assist? By purchasing some guard-slaves in the slave-market perhaps? So that the transaction is not generally observed?’

  Marcus shook his head. ‘More than that. I want you to smuggle my wife and family away and hide them safely until the risk is past. And as fast as possible. I’ll give you a sealed letter of authority until I get the warrant witnessed properly.’

  I gazed at him. ‘Where do you suggest?’

  ‘I’ll leave that up to you. It is quite impossible for me to organize, there are always people watching what I do and where I go. It’s easier for you. Find a way to get them out of the villa unobserved, take them somewhere and keep them hidden till I send for them again.’

  Getting a woman, a small boy and a babe in arms out of the villa and secreting them elsewhere without attracting anyone’s attention to the fact? It was impossible. There would be clothes and food and parcels of necessities. And – since we were talking about patricians here – no doubt there would also be a retinue of slaves. ‘But how can I do that?’ I allowed myself to say.

  He misinterpreted – or he affected to. ‘I’ll give you gold, of course – there’ll be no problem there – but ensure that no one knows where you are going or sees you leave here with my family. Obviously it isn’t safe to stay here at the house. You have seen the letter. Someone may choose to storm the walls or set the house on fire. So get them out, but guard them on the road: it would be too easy to seize and kill them there. Take them somewhere where they can’t be harmed. Once you’ve got them settled you can send and let me know, though you’ll have to contrive some way of doing that – I fear that, following these messages, there may well be spies already, watching every move.’

  ‘In that case, they will have seen me come today,’ I pointed out.

  Marcus chose to wave this irrelevance away. ‘Oh, I’ll send you with a letter to the garrison – they’ll assume you’ve come for that. The letter-writer will expect that I’ll report the threat – though obviously, as he says, there’s nothing much the commandant can do. Even if he left a guard here it could not be permanent, and all my enemy would have to do is wait. And, between ourselves, I’d be unwise to ask, in case the Emperor Didius has issued a decree declaring me a public enemy – I don’t want to be arrested by my own bodyguard! I’m better off providing protection for myself.’

  ‘So why send me to the garrison at all?’ It is a long way to Glevum at that time of day, and I had jobs to do at home.

  ‘I want to bid the commandant farewell, in any case, and that’s innocuous enough – so you can show the message, if by any chance you’re intercepted on the way.’ He reached across and patted me warmly on the arm, as though this were a comfort, rather than a recognition that I might be set upon. ‘They’ll recognize the tablet as having come from me.’

  I nodded. Marcus’s wax-tablet holders were famously ornate, and no doubt he’d use his seal.

  ‘In the meantime, you work out a scheme. And as soon as possible – my family’s not safe here.’ He gave me a smile. ‘Thank you, Libertus. I feel much relieved.’

  He always flattered when he wanted me for something difficult. I could not let it pass. ‘I’m sorry, Excellence. I’m not sure I can help. I’ll try to think of how it might be done of course – but I fear it may be near-impossible.’ I didn’t mention the obvious, that if I undertook this task, my own life was likely to be in danger too.

  ‘Oh, you’ll think of something, Libertus, my old friend. I rely on you for that.’ He gave me the smile again. He knew as well as I did that I had no choice. He might be in mortal danger and out of favour now, but he was still a powerful man – and it was not wise to cross him when he wanted something done.

  I bowed, in silent acknowledgement of this.

  ‘Then, I’ll go and write this letter to the commandant. I’ll send a servant in here with some figs for you, meanwhile.’ And he was gone, leaving me to stare at the pavement after all, cursing the Fates who had allowed me to get involved in this.

  THREE

  The message, when it finally appeared, was not written on my patron’s fancy writing-block, it was written on the one which had contained the threat. Marcus had symbolically obliterated it by warming up the wax and scratching over it. It was not what I’d expected, and I was sure it was not wise – there was now no proof of what the original had said. But it was clearly too late now. He hadn’t even attached his seal to it, merely tied it with the fraying cords which were affixed.

  It was delivered to me by a pretty little page – one of my patron’s recent purchases – whom I’d not seen before and who had nothing whatever to report.

  ‘No further message?’

  The servant shook his head. ‘Master says that you’ll know what to do with it.’

  I gazed at the wax tablet. Could it tell me anything? It had been handsome, once, with carving on the frame – clearly the possession of a wealthy man. I had seen such things before, imported at some cost for private customers, who might in fact buy several at a time. It might be possible to trace who’d purchased it, if the original importer could be found, though it was clea
rly very old and worn. Besides, the recipient of a message, where there is no reply, is often expected to keep the tablet as a gift – as Marcus had effectively just done, himself – so this one might have changed hands several times by now, or even been collected from a rubbish pile.

  My thoughts were interrupted by the page. ‘Citizen, if you are ready to depart, your attendant is already awaiting you outside,’ the boy said, sweetly, pulling back the inner door. ‘I’ll show you out to him. And then, if you’ll excuse me, I have other tasks to do. My master is expecting dinner guests tonight.’

  I paused mid-pace and turned to stare at him. ‘The household is expecting visitors?’ Any one of which could be the letter-writer, I thought bitterly. How like Marcus not to think of that – or mention it to me.

  The boy gazed innocently back at me. Clearly he was not in his master’s confidence and saw no threat at all. And I knew Marcus was anxious to behave as if everything was normal in the house. So how should I proceed? I chose my words with care.

  ‘Tell your owner to be careful whom he invites here from now on,’ I said.

  The boy looked startled. ‘Citizen! I would not dare to speak to him like that.’

  ‘Tell him it’s a message from Libertus.’ His face was still doubtful and I pressed the point. ‘Warn him from me that the times are dangerous. After all, the Emperor Pertinax is dead. Your master may have hidden enemies.’

  A disbelieving smile curved the pretty lips. ‘Oh, these are ancient friends. Councillor Varius Quintus Flavius and his brother Claudius.’

  I nodded. I slightly knew the councillor concerned – handsome, charming and ruthless as a bull. ‘A long-standing invitation?’ It occurred to me that Marcus had ruled against him once in a legal wrangle pertaining to some land. Yet apparently it had not crossed my patron’s mind that the man might be the author of the note. ‘I did not know His Excellence had been in touch with anyone in the colonia as yet.’

  The page was already opening the outer door. ‘He did not contact Varius, citizen. Varius sent to him. He sent a messenger requesting an urgent audience – something about hoping to speed up a hearing in the courts – but the master was still weary from his travelling and didn’t want to go into the town, so he invited Varius and his brother to dine here next day.’

  ‘But they did not come?’ That was disquieting. A sign that Marcus’s status had declined.

  ‘There was a sudden sickness in the house and they sent again to say they could not come that night, so His Excellence renewed the invitation for today. It gave them time for the malady to pass and if they really wanted him, they would ignore the Ides, he said. Besides, he’s decided that he wants them to be witnesses of some document that he is drawing up – he has to have Roman citizens for that. I thought that’s why he might have wanted you.’

  ‘I would not have been suitable at all,’ I said. It sounded deprecating but it was the truth – since the document was almost certainly the one he’d told me of and I could not be a witness since it appointed me. ‘Nonetheless,’ I went on firmly, ‘since he has guests tonight, please pass my message on. Tell him – from me – to keep armed slaves around him at all times and advise him, in particular, not to partake of any gifts of food or wine. Not without employing a slave as food-taster.’

  ‘If you say so, citizen,’ the pageboy said, in a tone which made me doubt that he would do so, even now. ‘And now – if you permit, my master is waiting for me to help him change and wash his feet before he eats.’ And nothing, he implied, must keep Marcus from his food. ‘This way, citizen.’ He gestured me firmly towards the entrance court.

  I longed to speak to Marcus and warn him of my fears, but there was nothing I could do. I sighed and allowed the page to usher me outside. I collected my own servant, who was waiting in the lane. ‘Home!’ I told him, and together we set off down the wooded lane. ‘I’ve got to go to Glevum, but the way leads past our gate.’ Besides, I would have to tell my wife where I was going.

  How one event can change an atmosphere! Only a little earlier – on the way to Marcus’s – I had revelled in the beauty of the stony lane dappled with sunlight through the bright green leaves and the summer forest, still and silent as a sleeping slave. Now all at once, the woods seemed menacing. I was convinced that there were unseen eyes trained on me from the trees and the undergrowth seemed full of rustlings. I was glad that I had brought an attendant slave with me, though I’d only done so for convention’s sake. Such things – like the clumsy toga that I wore – were expected when calling on His Excellence.

  It was little Tenuis who was escorting me today. As the newest and youngest of my household he had been the easiest to spare from other chores and he was intensely proud of being chosen for the task, stalking along in his new tunic like a midget Emperor and swaggering mightily. He could not have been more than five or six years old, at most, so naturally I didn’t tell him anything about my interview – time enough to worry him if anything occurred. Instead, I encouraged him to talk.

  The child had been a land-slave before he came to me, and had not been trained in household protocol. So, although he’d now learned to wait respectfully till he was spoken to, once he’d started talking he was hard to stop. Perversely, that was what I was now relying on. If there was anyone loitering nearby, his piping voice would make it clear that I was not alone. (Not that Tenuis would be of any help in fighting off attack, but he was small and slippery as an eel. If nothing else, he could scuttle off and fetch rescue from the house.) So I asked the boy how they’d received him at the villa we’d just left (where he’d once been an outside servant of no account at all) and he prattled cheerfully.

  ‘Oh they treated me with more respect than you’d believe, master – though only because I now belong to you. Do you know they even offered me some buttermilk and a piece of new-baked bread …’

  I listened to his burblings with only half an ear while I scanned the forest for any signs of the watchers that I feared were hiding there. I was beginning to conclude that my qualms weren’t justified when, just as we rounded the corner towards the enclosure where my roundhouse lay, I glimpsed a darting movement in the trees. Animal or human? I could not be sure, but suspicion was enough. I decided in that instant that – since I was forced to go to town – the safest method was to ride there on my mule. Arlina is not the fastest animal alive, but she moves more quickly than I can walk myself – and can deliver a fearsome kick, besides.

  I had travelled the road to Glevum many hundred times but suddenly the prospect seemed a daunting one. The track ran for miles through unfrequented woods, and I was acutely conscious, all at once, of how few people ever went that way and of how narrow, steep and treacherous the path can be in parts: ideal for an ambush, if such a thing were planned. And it was already well past noon. If I was to go to the colonia, I must do so soon – it was possible that at the garrison I would be forced to wait some time. The daytime hours are longer at this time of the year but today, of all days, I did not want to be returning in the dusk!

  So, as soon as I got home I went inside ready to announce that I was leaving instantly, but I found my assembled family sitting round the fire. Gwellia, my wife, was fussing over the new infant in its mother’s arms while my adopted son, Junio, and his two-year-old boy tucked into the fresh oatcakes that had been baked for them.

  ‘Ah, Father, there you are at last. Come and see your pretty little grandson,’ Cilla, the new mother, called out to me at once. ‘We’ve saved some oatcakes for you and there’s fresh bread and cheese.’

  I shook my head. ‘I’m afraid I cannot stay. I’m obliged to take a message to the garrison at once.’

  Gwellia frowned. ‘Could not your patron have excused you that today?’

  ‘It’s urgent business but it should not take too long.’ I hoped I sounded more convincing than I felt. ‘It’s just a message to the commandant.’

  ‘Poor Father. Forced to go to Glevum, and on the Ides as well. I can just imagine it,’
Cilla said, and added, in a wonderful imitation of my patron’s voice, ‘Just a small commission for you, my old friend!’

  Everybody laughed. She was famous for her mimicry – and knew Marcus well, of course. She had been a slave-girl at the villa once, just as Junio had been a slave of mine. (When I freed him and adopted him, he’d gained my rank, of course, and she’d become a citizen when she married him.)

  Today, however, her clowning did not make me smile. ‘It’s a serious matter. I will try to hurry back. I’ll take my toga off and ride the mule to town.’

  Gwellia made a little face at me. ‘Trust Marcus to find an errand which must be done at once, so you don’t have time to eat. I’ll wrap some oatcakes for you, to stave off hunger-pangs.’ It was typical of Gwellia to be concerned for me. Of course, she had no notion that there might be a threat, and I certainly wasn’t going to worry her with that – especially in front of our young visitors.

  However, while she was busy wrapping the food in a clean cloth and Tenuis was saddling up my animal, I stepped out to the round hut where I kept my tools and took the unusual precaution of sliding a knife into my belt – a very sharp one which I used for pruning trees. My intention was to hide it underneath my cape: carrying a potential weapon in a public place is a serious offence for civilians like myself.

  Unfortunately Gwellia had followed me outside, and caught me in the act. ‘What are you doing, husband?’ she exclaimed. Her face was horrified. ‘Dear gods! A knife! What’s Marcus said to you? I knew that there was something that you weren’t telling us. Are there Druid rebels in the woods again?’

  I shook my head. ‘Not that I know of,’ I said truthfully – though I was less honest when I added, ‘but it’s the Ides of June – and there are bears about. The general omens are so dreadful nowadays, I felt that some protection would be wise.’